Thursday, December 17, 2009

I hope your season is going great and you guys are having lots of fun. What a busy time of year this is! I am so buried in work that I am not making any Christmas goodies this year. So I thought I would pull from the archives and give you guys the links to some older blog posts relating to holiday yummies. Maybe these will refresh your memory and spark some creative ideas you can try out this year.

A while back I got an order for a camo fishing hat for a little boy's birthday. I wanted it to look very realistic; like a real hat. I did not think buttercream camo would give me the look I wanted. So I started to brainstorm about a way to do it in fondant. An easier and less painful way than buttercream.

Guess what. It wast not easier nor less painful. It was more so. It took for-ev-er. My children had birthdays that I missed in the time it took to do this hat. It was very tedious and labor intensive.

BUT..... it looked friggin' awesome man! It looked like a real fabric hat! People were amazed that it was cake. The press came to my house to report about it. The President called to congratulate me. They put up a plaque in my honor at the Wildlife and Fisheries Museum here in New Orleans. Yes folks, it looked just that good.

Oh wait, none of that happened. That was the exhaustion induced dream I had that night.

Anyway, let me show you guys how to do this technique if you ever lose your mind enough to give it a try:

First I carved 2 layers of round cake to have a slight taper up the sides. I also carved some small indentations into the sides to give the look of rumpled fabric, like a truly worn hat. That was crumb coated and covered with a very thin layer of white fondant.

The camouflage layer was made by putting "puzzle pieces" of the colored fondant together side by side. First I penciled the camo pattern onto a piece of paper, marked them the color I wanted each to be, and then cut those pieces out. Each piece was used as a template to cut out the corresponding color of fondant.

Each piece of colored fondant was stuck to a thin layer of white fondant underneath with a little water. This under layer of fondant was there to ensure that the pieces stayed together and did not fall apart when I picked up the larger finished piece. I kept the whole piece under plastic while I was working on it to prevent it from drying out.

When I got one piece big enough to cover the top of the hat, I used a slightly fabric textured mat on it to give a little bit more of a fabric look. That piece was then glued to the top of the hat with water. And the excess hanging over the sides of the top of the hat was cut off with an exacto knife.

The same process was followed to make a piece to apply to the sides. I used two pieces to wrap around the sides, and covered the side seems later.

Here is one side piece in place and the top edge trimmed flush with the top of the cake.

Here is the 2nd side piece in place, about to be trimmed on top.

The same process was done to cover a cardboard cake circle, which served as the brim of the hat. The cake part was put on top of this cake circle.

Then I used strips of green fondant, and some strings from the clay gun to finish off the cake and hide all of the seems. My stitching tool was used to put a stitching effect on the wider strips of green fondant.

The fishing lures and dog tags were made of gumpaste and painted silver.

I doweled the base cake and put the camo hat on top.

And here is the finished product:

Ta dah! Pretty cool huh? It really did come out great and had a very realistic and clean look. My client and I were both very happy.

Give it a try if you have a chance. If you are like me, you will do it once because the cake artist in you must conquer it. Then you will never do it again. LOL

Seriously, I hope you guys try this. It was time consuming, but very fun to watch it all come together. Be sure to send me pics if you do!

Tuesday, December 1, 2009

Thank you all for the wonderful testimonials. They are going to be a great addition to our new SugarEd Website.

Along with working on the new site, and editing the new DVD (for early 2010 release), we are also cooking up some new exciting projects to offer you in 2010 and 2011. We have a lot of things simmering on the burners, so stay tuned for more info to come!

The winner of the testimonial drawing is:

Morsels By Mark said...I have all of the SugarEd Dvd's. Sharon is an informative teacher and very fun to watch. I look forward to purchasing each an every dvd she puts out! Her customer service is bar none and she is one of the fastest shippers! Other cake instructors should follow her lead!

Congratulations! Please email me to claim your prize!

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I also have exciting news to share with you guys! I have been invited to return to TLC's Ultimate Cake Off for season two! I cannot disclose any of the details yet, or the Cake Off Police will come arrest me and throw away the key. And that would not be good. So for now I must be quiet.

I will be spending a large portion of the upcoming weeks in work mode, so please bear with me if my blog posts are a little bit more infrequent than usual. I am very excited, and more than a little bit nervous! I do know, no matter what happens, it will be a great experience and a lot of fun to spend time with my teammates, who I will introduce you to later on.